The present invention relates to a performance recording apparatus for recording information used for controlling electronic instruments to generate music.
Performance recording apparatuses utilizing playing information of an MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) have been proposed. The apparatus records playing information input from a keyboard of an electronic instrument or a computer in the form of digital event data showing operation of keys on the keyboard.
Playing information input signals or event data from a keyboard of an electronic instrument or a computer is first recorded on a recording track in a memory of the recording apparatus and then transferred to a merge track to be merged with playing information of other instruments. Each event data includes a channel discrimination code for discriminating it from data of other musical instruments. When event data corresponding to plural musical instruments are merged and stored on a merge track, data of a desired instrument are easily specified and selected with the channel discrimination code. A new channel is set by an operator corresponding to the channel discrimination code each time event data for plural electronic instruments are newly input. Namely, each channel is assigned by the operator to playing information for each of plural electronic instruments.
Each event data from an electronic instrument is thus recorded on a recording track by designating the channels. Plural recorded event data are then successively transferred from the recording track to a merge track to be merged thereon; the whole performance of music is thus completed.
The following problems, however, have arisen in the above process. When the receiving channel is not updated by the operator, a channel which has already been assigned to formerly stored event data is again assigned to receive event data newly sent from an electronic instrument. Switch-over between the channel setting mode and the recording mode is to be repeated many times when event data corresponding to a number of channels are merged with one another; it is rather troublesome. In a simple recording system without a display or certain switches, the current set channel is not shown when event data are newly input and recorded, and channels which have already been assigned to other event data are not specified easily.